Tag: infrastructure

Iraq and Cuba hit by blackouts amid US pressure and attacks on Iran

Both Iraq and Cuba have been plunged into nationwide blackouts, with the Middle Eastern country’s grid collapsing after a sudden drop in gas supplies to a major power plant in Basra, while the Caribbean island’s outage is being blamed on chronic fuel shortages worsened by the US blockade on Venezuelan oil.

The day before the Iraqi blackout, an Electricity Ministry spokesperson was quoted as saying that “incomplete supplies” of gas from neighboring Iran were already affecting power plant operations. Iran has been facing a massive US-Israeli air campaign since Saturday.

A separate power facility also experienced a shutdown in central Salah al-Din province, with local police explicitly denying reports that the station was targeted by an attack, according to the state-run INA news agency.

Iraq relies on Iranian gas for 30-40% of its power generation. The dependence is a direct consequence of decades of foreign intervention in the country. Before the 1991 Gulf War, the grid, though strained by sanctions, largely met demand. The war destroyed 75% of its generating capacity, and the 2003 US-led invasion caused a catastrophic collapse to less than 10% of prior output.

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DOE Announces $171 Million For Geothermal Expansion

The DOE released a Notice of Funding Opportunity offering up to $171.5 million for next-generation geothermal field tests and resource exploration.

The program targets field-scale demonstrations of enhanced geothermal systems (EGS) for electricity generation, along with drilling to characterize and confirm hydrothermal and next-gen prospects nationwide.

The funding splits into two initial open topics: up to $100 million for EGS field tests and $71.5 million for exploratory drilling. Letters of intent are due March 27, with full applications due April 30. The move directly supports President Trump’s Executive Order “Unleashing American Energy,” according to the agency.

Geothermal currently supplies roughly 4 GW of U.S. capacity, but represents only about 0.3% of total power generation. DOE estimates the resource base could support 300 GW or more by 2050 with technology improvements, delivering firm, 24/7 baseload power that complements intermittent renewables and meets rising demand from data centers and AI infrastructure.

Recent studies show that some of the best locations in the United States for new geothermal sites are in the western part of the country and some of the southern states.

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Hungary To Deploy Troops To Energy Facilities As Tensions With Ukraine Grow

Tensions between Ukraine and Hungary continue as Kyiv continues to destroy energy facilities which supply Russian gas to the central European nation. Budapest has blocked the 90M EUR loan package to Ukraine as a result, and is now taking further security measures.

Ukraine’s President Zelenskiy insulted Orban at the Munich Security Conference and Ukraine has a history of suppressing the Hungarian culture in Ukraine.

Viktor Orbán said Hungary will deploy troops and increase security around key energy facilities amid tensions with Ukraine over Druzhba pipeline disruptions.

Hungary also imposed a drone ban near the Ukrainian border and has blocked EU measures supporting Kyiv, reports Pravda Hungary.

Orban called out Zelenskiy over his continuation of the conflict.

This crisis could result in the European Union splitting or even collapsing, as globalist European capitals continue to push for global war.

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Las Vegas Police Investigate Possible Terrorist Attack After Man Plows Into Electric Substation

Authorities are investigating a possible terrorist attack in Nevada.

Las Vegas police have reported they are investigating a possible terror attack after a man drove his vehicle into a power station in Boulder City, Nevada.

Sheriff Kevin McMahill, during a press conference, shared that a 23-year-old suspect who was previously reported missing in New York drove across the country and crashed his vehicle into a secure gate at the Los Angeles Department of Water and Power facility.

McMahill told the room full of reporters that they obtained multiple books related to extremist ideologies as well as explosive materials during their investigation of the suspect.

KTNV reported the suspect has been identified as 23-year-old Dawson Maloney of Albany, New York.

The outlet further reported that Maloney, following the crash, died from a self-inflicted gunshot wound.

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Left-Wing Activists Ran Off the Normal People Who Knew How to Do Their Jobs

A story flying below the radar of most national media has been the drawn-out loss of electric power by tens of thousands of Nashville-area residents. About 200,000 Nashville Electric Services (“NES”) customers lost power in an ice storm on Sunday, Jan. 25. A week later, there were still over 30,000 customers without service, with temperatures continuing to dip well below freezing. The mounting death toll has included a 92-year-old man and a 79-year-old woman, both found dead in their frigid residences.

NES is a public utility that has been captured by woke leadership focused on DEI (Diversity, Equity, Inclusion) and ESG (Environmental Social Governance) rather than focusing on being a provider of reliable, affordable energy.

As documented by the Tennessee Star, NES produced a “Community Investment Report” with a heavy focus on green energy, sustainability, and DEI. The CEO, Teresa Broyles-Aplin, boasted that employees were put through over 100 “Diversity, Equity, Inclusion, Accessibility, & Belonging” training sessions. The report also identified “renewable energy, electrification, energy efficiency and demand response, resiliency, diversity, equity and inclusion, employee engagement and development, and greenhouse gas emission as the topics most important to NES and stakeholders simultaneously.” Maintaining a functioning electric grid is noticeably absent from that itemization.

One reason the storm was so destructive is that NES deliberately refrained from trimming trees along power lines. Just this past August, Ms. Broyles-Aplin boasted on a local TV station about the utility’s decision not to do preventative trimming, stating that “We care about the canopy. We have to live here too. I don’t want us out destroying the canopy.” Unfortunately, that canopy got covered in ice, and much of it fell on power lines, causing extensive damage. With NES apparently incapable of handling the core functions of a utility, nor capable of getting service restored, there is a growing clamor by state politicians for changes in how the inept utility is run.

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Electricity shortage event “plausible” in next 5 years

Ireland’s energy regulator has warned that a national electricity shortage is a “plausible” scenario within the next five years if peak demand reaches currently projected levels.

The assessment was published by the Commission for Regulation of Utilities (CRU) as part of its Risk Preparedness Plan (RPP). The report, a legal requirement for all EU member states every four years, examines potential disaster scenarios to assess their hypothetical severity and likelihood.

“CRISIS-TYPE SCENARIOS”

Working in “close collaboration” with grid operator EirGrid, the CRU examined “crisis-type scenarios” that could “lead to significant national-scale impacts on the electricity system” and the general public.

The findings were based on the All-Island Resource Adequacy Assessment 2025–2034 (AIRAA), a joint report by EirGrid and SONI which forecasts how supply and demand will align over the coming decade.

“If the maximum demand forecast trajectory described in the AIRAA materialised, it is plausible that there could be an electricity shortage event within the next 2 to 5 year period,” the CRU stated, noting that “as such mitigation plans to address this must be put in place.”

“REASONABLE WORST-CASE SCENARIOS”, NOT “PREDICTIONS”

However, the regulator stressed that the findings should be viewed as “reasonable worst-case scenarios” rather than “predictions”. The RPP is designed to ensure the energy system can plan and prepare for potential crises.

“These are not predictions of what will happen, but are plausible events that could occur in a reasonable worst case and typically would involve the alignment / occurrence of a number of simultaneous issues to occur to be actualised,” the regulator said.

The report noted that Ireland shares common risks with other EU nations, including extreme weather, natural disasters, malicious cyber attacks, pandemics, solar storms, and supply chain disruptions.

MITIGATION EFFORTS

To manage these risks, the CRU pointed to existing mitigation measures, including the Security of Supply (SoS) Programme and the recently introduced Large Energy User (LEU) connection policy.

The LEU policy specifically targets the power demands of new data centres, which accounted for 22% of Ireland’s total metered electricity in 2024, according to Central Statistics Office (CSO) figures. Under the new rules, these facilities are required to provide 80% of their power from renewable generation to reduce pressure on the national grid.

Further investment is also underway following the CRU’s approval in November of an €18.9 billion capital programme. The five-year plan aims to modernise the existing network and build new infrastructure to meet rising demand.

As an additional safeguard, the Moneypoint power station has been reconfigured as a backup facility. Following the end of coal-fired generation at the site last year, the plant now operates using Heavy Fuel Oil (HFO).

“Moneypoint power station is available as a generator of last resort since the start of July 2025,” the CRU confirmed. The facility will remain in place as an emergency “strategic reserve” until 2029.

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“Out Of Touch”: Marylanders Fume As Gov. Moore Prioritizes Building Energy-Hungry ‘Sphere’ Amid Power Bill Crisis

Marylanders are raging at left-wing Governor Wes Moore, accusing him of fast-tracking a massively power-hungry Sphere entertainment venue near Washington, DC, while working-class households across the central part of the state are drowning under crushing electricity bills.

“So this Governor spends money he doesn’t even have yet. 200 million dollars of the cost for the Sphere at National Harbor will come from the State of Maryland’s 2027 budget. He is so out of touch with what MD residents need and doesn’t care as long as his name is in the headlines every day,” Maryland resident Amy Milberger Seaman wrote in a Facebook group called “BGE Victims,” which has nearly 15,000 residents upset about exploding power bills.

Local media outlet WBAL-TV reported Monday that Sphere Entertainment plans to build its second U.S. Sphere venue in National Harbor, in Prince George’s County.

The Sphere will be slightly smaller than the one in Las Vegas, seating 6,000. Gov. Moore called the project the largest economic development project in the county’s history. The venue is expected to be funded through a mix of public and private financing, including $200 million in incentives from the state.

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“I’m $6K Behind”: Maryland Power Bill Crisis Sparks Debt Panic As 14,000 Residents Cry For Help Online

The Maryland power bill crisis first came to our attention in August 2024, when years of poor power-grid management by Democrats (mostly due to backfiring ‘green’ policies) in the state collided with surging electricity demand from AI data centers.

Fast forward to today: the power bill crisis in the one-party rule state of Democratic Party kings and queens, headed by leftist Gov. Wes Moore, who has presidential ambitions, is getting hammered in the polling numbers (new data from Annapolis-based Gonzales Research & Media) as struggling Marylanders are financially crushed by mounting power-bill debt and venting their frustration in a Facebook group with nearly 14,000 angry residents.

The Facebook group called “BGE Victims” has amassed 13.7k members, with many in the group pointing fingers at not just the local utility BGE or the grid operator PJM, but also the one-party rule of Democrats in the state who have masqueraded as competent managers but in reality are far-left activists looting the state’s coffers to fund pet projects from supporting illegal aliens to all things woke.

Epic grid mismanagement, such as retiring fossil fuel power plants and de-growthing the grid with unreliable solar and wind to solve what Democrats say is a climate crisis emergency, has been nothing more than mismanagement, and the end result has been the financial destruction of the working class.

“I just joined this post and I’m in the same situation as a lot of people my BG& bill is 800dollars a month and I have no idea why I’ve called them and they’ve even came out and they told me the same thing that they told other people change my lightbulbs do this do that and it’s still that much right now I’m in a worse situation than ever my BgE bill has accumulated. I’m not kidding to almost $6000 behind they can’t cut the electric off till the end of February,” Baltimore resident Sheryl Harrison wrote in the group, posting her total past due amount from her electricity bill that tops nearly $6,100.

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“Emergency Intervention”: Trump To Cap Residential Electric Bills By Forcing Tech Giants To Pay For Soaring Power Costs

Back in August, when the American population was just waking up to the dire consequences the exponentially growing army of data centers spawned across the country was having on residential electricity bills, we said that the chart of US CPI would soon become the most popular (not in a good way) chart in the financial realm.

One month later we added that it was only a matter of time before Trump, realizing that soaring electricity costs would almost certainly cost Republicans the midterms, would enforce price caps.

Turns out we were right.

And while Trump obviously can not pull a communist rabbit out of his hat, and centrally plan the entire US power grid, what he can do is precisely what he is about to announce. 

According to Bloomberg, Trump and the governors of several US Northeastern states agreed to push for an emergency wholesale electricity auction that would compel technology companies to effectively fund new power plants, effectively putting a cap for residential power prices at the expense of hyperscalers and data centers. Which, come to think of it, we also proposed back in October.

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Data Centers Use Lots of Electricity. This Bill Would Let Them Go Off the Grid.

Tech companies are building data centers as quickly as possible to run AI. These facilities are controviersial because they use copious amounts of electricity and might tax an electrical grid that in some areas is already straining.

In a bill introduced last week, Sen. Tom Cotton (R–Ark.) proposed an idea: letting these companies get off the grid altogether.

“Power officials have been raising concerns that the grid isn’t equipped to handle the sheer number of data centers tech companies are seeking to build,” Katherine Blunt wrote last week at The Wall Street Journal. “They say it will take many years to build new transmission lines and power plants needed to support the surge in demand while keeping the lights on for other customers.” Some officials, Blunt noted, “have proposed either requiring or encouraging data centers to stop using [the grid] when there is a risk of blackouts, either by powering down or switching to backup electricity supplies.”

Jowi Morales of Tom’s Hardware reports companies are “looking at alternative power sources to bring their projects online, regardless of the availability of power from the grid.” Microsoft, for example, is recommissioning the Three Mile Island nuclear plant in Pennsylvania to generate 835 megawatts of energy for its data centers (though not without a $1 billion loan from U.S. taxpayers).

“These initiatives will take years to take off, though,” Morales adds. “The Three Mile Island plant is expected to be operational only by 2028.”

Last week, Cotton introduced the Decentralized Access to Technology Alternatives (DATA) Act of 2026. Under the bill, “a consumer-regulated electric utility” would be “exempt from regulation” under federal law so long as it doesn’t connect to the overall electrical grid.

When one company contracts to sell electricity to another company, “that retail transaction presently would put you under the jurisdiction of a bunch of people” at the state and federal levels, says Travis Fisher, director of energy and environmental policy studies at the Cato Institute.

And that brings a cumbersome level of red tape. “The rapid pace of innovation means the AI revolution won’t wait for multi-year permitting fights, cost-of-service hearings held by regulators, or planning processes built for the analog era,” Fisher pointed out last year in an article co-written by Cato’s Jennifer Huddleston. “And yet those are the structures that still govern electricity in much of the country. Building a new transmission line in the US now takes about 10 years, while generation projects spend multiple years stuck in interconnection queues, with more than 2,600 gigawatts of capacity now in queues nationwide.”

The DATA Act would lower the level of regulatory intrusion for enclosed systems that don’t connect to the grid. “It just serves data centers that are probably going to be clustered around it without taking electricity supply off the market for Arkansas families and businesses,” Cotton told the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette.

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